Secularism Needs Natural Law

Noah Millman has a very, very good skeptical mediation on the natural law, and why, in his view, natural law arguments fail. I can’t begin to do it justice by excerpting it here, but what it boils down to is even if you claim that observation tells you what human nature is, and which acts fulfill that telos, you still have to have some sort of sorting principle to determine what human nature is, and whether or not an act is consonant with it. The gist of Noah’s post:

It seems to me that this is the reason that natural law arguments fail in practice. It’s not that we can’t accept that we have natures, or that those natures might be constraining in one fashion or another – outside of certain politically touchy topics, we entertain the idea that our natures constrain us, and how we can pursue (and achieve) happiness, all the time. It’s that the advocates of a natural law approach cannot explain adequately how they know what they claim to know about our natures, and expose that purported knowledge to scientific criticism of the kind that we would recognize if the question were, say, “do dogs feel pain?” And the suspicion grows, over time, that this question isn’t opened not because it cannot be opened but because it must not be opened, because it is really the conclusions that are “known” absolutely, and not the premises.

The idea of universal human rights was the greatest moral revolution in history since the Sermon on the Mount, and it has given us phenomenal, unimaginable moral progress, from reductions in crueltyto modern governance to unimaginable prosperity. Universal human rights are pretty important.

But of course, as any freshman philosophy student can tell, the problem comes when you try to ground those universal human rights. Where do they come from? Who confers them? Why should they be respected?

There’s basically only two ways to do so, one theistic and one non-theistic. Universal human rights are perfectly grounded if they come from God, as the Declaration of Independence asserts and as I believe in my heart of hearts. But not everybody likes that, and it sort of defeats the purpose of creating this secular moral system to begin with.

The only other way that I’m aware of to ground the idea of universal human rights is in, wait for it, the natural law. Without appealing to God, the only way to ground the idea of universal human rights is if there is such a thing as human nature, which is shared by human beings, because they are human beings, and which includes the endowment of rights. This is the classic formulation of secular Enlightenment morality.

If you don’t have the concept of natural law, and you don’t believe in God, then there’s no such thing as inalienable human rights, or at least they stand on no more solid a ground than a theory of rights derived from divine command. PEG draws a sharp conclusion:

As a Catholic, the decline of the natural law leaves me almost indifferent. As a fan of and believer in secular Enlightenment morality, it leaves me very, very, very concerned.

PEG’s short essay, I think, exposes in a clear, concise way why secular liberalism is only apparently rational, and how it depends on faith in a conception of human nature that can’t be grounded in empirical observation, but is more or less parasitical on the rejected Christian understanding. The English political philosopher and skeptic John Gray’s work is illuminating on this point. For one thing, Gray considers the Enlightenment and the myths that emerged from it to be more or less a secular restatement of (for Gray, mistaken) utopian Christian morality.

(Hey readers, I’ll be away this morning in a recording studio putting some final touches on the audiobook version of The Little Way Of Ruthie Leming. I’ll approve comments as I can, but please be patient.)

“Nihilism, by the way, is wonderful fun when you’re an angry young man of 50. Once you start burying your friends (take that literally) at a rate of one every year, it loses its appeal right fast.”

Not sure how fun it is…all that brooding and meaninglessness. But regardless, the point isn’t whether it’s fun or not. The point is that it’s what one is stuck with logically once you no longer are willing to believe in the natural law and/or God.

“Are animals nihilists? To my knowledge animals don’t have a belief in God, but we see cooperative behavior in nature all the time. Eusocial insects and wolf packs being obvious examples, but even red bellied piranha take turns when eating.”

Agreed. However, insects eat each other after mating, devour their offspring, and though I am certain the red bellied piranha is exquisitely polite while waiting his turn to feed on his weaker mates, I am not sure any of them have a produced a civilization.

If a society wishes live like animals, well, who am I to stop it? Just don’t be naive enough to expect all the niceties that go along with being human. Welcome to the jungle.

The notion that there is some, bizarre, pre-existent code buried in the human genome is, on the basis of the evidence, wrong, and so is natural law. To formulate a culture based on it is like doing chemistry based on the four elements. It won’t work.

Well, in some way intelligence, selfawareness, conscience, altruism and a significant set of elements of culture are in fact emergent from what lies encoded in DNA.

Chimpanzees have all the qualities mentioned. Somewhat less cognitively complex animals have recognizable, though lesser, forms of these things.

The “code” is the truth that humans are not “anything goes” creatures. A violent jungle, such as we have today, largely ruled by liberal attitudes and behaviors, is not beneficial to human existence. Because harm is not congruent with human well-being. Being dysfunctional, perverted, perverse, violent, dehumanized all go against this natural code.

That’s frankly the perspective of the inmate looking out the window of the insane asylum. “All those people Out There live without the mental crutches and restraints necessary to me, oblivious to the things that give me obsessive thoughts and drive me to violence, always violating The Rules Of The Asylum I obey…. When I yell at them, why do they look sad, laugh wryly, and yell back that no, I’m the insane one? Why can’t they understand that I have learned all The Bitter Truth That Governs All and they are so perfectly ignorant, perverse, the truly insane of course…I must go back to the window and tell them. Oh wait, here comes dinner! Delish!”

“My secular morality premise is pretty straightforward: I believe that humans have worth and should be treated well. Feel free to throw some Golden Rule in there.”

You ‘believe’, eh? Does the verb ‘believe’ mean you think that the statement ‘humans have worth is ‘true’? That it corresponds to reality? Based on what? Certainly not on “science” whatever that means.

In fact, I suspect that in your positivistic/atheistic view of the world you must find it very hard to attribute any objective meaning about the word “worth.” To say that anything is worth something is already a metaphysical statement.

Dakarian, I like the way you set up the logic. It has an elegance that helps simplify the topic… which, if you (general) will allow me another whine, is sorely lacking in this sort of topic. 😀

Dakarian and Steph: I have a personal “theory” that religion comes in two broad categories. “Revealed” is based on holy text or strictly structured oral tradition (the Celts exemplified the latter). “Acquired” is based primarily on personal experience. They overlap in the sense that we are all learning creatures — an evolutionist would call that adaptation based on cognitive processes — and the category would be set by the order in which they take place.

My religious faith is experiential. I would come after-the-fact to attempts to find a rational basis for my experiences. The experience came first, as it were, then came something that revealed its meaning.

Our discussions/debates over natural law fit nicely into my view.

Elijah: How do you do the “what” without knowing the “how” and “why”?

I don’t mean to be glib, but how do you define “knowing”? Faith is a visceral thing. Your personal dilemma begs a question following on what I wrote above: Do you know because you were told, or do you know because you experienced it?

I didn’t come across my theory on my own. It developed over time, and was directly inspired by people I knew, mostly Christians, whose internalized faith was indistinguishable from any belief system that might have been conveyed to them externally. They lived their faith, exemplified by a moment-to-moment expression of it rather than any demonstration of worship, ritual or reading of a holy text. Knowing them challenged me to justify my own beliefs, because there was not nor is there still anything I can point to or cite. I have no holy text that I can hand over to a person and say “this is what I believe”.

I normally break up responses in separate posts, and I apologize for the length of this one, but my original point remains, to me, the most critical one. So long as we judge others by the trappings of their beliefs, the “what”, we prohibit our understanding of their “how” and “why”. A secular morality only requires the “what”. A valid pluralism affords to all the room for their personal or collective “how” and “why” without requiring them to be in agreement with others. The secular social contract, if you will, only requires agreement with the “what”.

Elijah, a friendly personal comment: In my opinion, any religion that doesn’t have a significant point where the believer is challenged to demonstrate the pull-yourself-up-by-your-own-boot-straps ability is a religion that is doomed to decline and disappear. Thus speaks the shamanic aspect of my own beliefs. Free coffee tastes as good as how much you paid for it. 😀

It’s odd how few secularists are willing to admit that they’re just super apes with yet another opinion.

Technically there’s no collating sequence in evolution. So we’re just apes with an opinion, not super apes. But this is our right because man is the only one doing any talking. Even claims of divine revelation are made by humans on God’s behalf.

As I said on an earlier thread I regard “natural law” as completely unnecessary as a guide to morality when we have Jesus’ two “laws of love”, which require no degrees in philosophy (or even a high school diploma) to understand. I do understand there are practical reasons they cannot be used as a basis for public policy*.
However, the term “natural law” needs to retired. It is a complete misnomer in the modern world where the term “natural law” means “laws of nature” as discovered by science. And it’s something of a fraud when proponents of “natural law” insist that it has nothing whatsoever to do with nature anyway.
Might I suggest “moral teleology” as a more accurate term?
Also, the natural law proponents do need to admit that, yes, arguments based on their thinking have been wrong, even disastrously wrong in the past. See: arguments against interest, arguments in favor of slavery, arguments against political rights for women. With that embarrassing record I’d dump the whole project and start over, but if they insist then they really need to reexamine their opinions about gays in the same light of their former errors.
As I said some time back, I can respect a argument made in the form “The Bible tells me so” on any given subject (though I said “respect”, not “agree”). That is faith, and loyalty to the Lord, even if sometimes mistaken. But bad arguments made on the basis of failed ancient metaphysics really do not engender much respect from me at all.

* Actually the Golden Rule (which can be secularized) works very well as a basis for policy: we do not violate others because we do not wish to be violated ourselves. But God forbid we make something simple enough that the masses can understand it!

However, insects eat each other after mating, devour their offspring, and though I am certain the red bellied piranha is exquisitely polite while waiting his turn to feed on his weaker mates, I am not sure any of them have a produced a civilization.

I’m sure that insects are shocked by our lack of mating decorum. However, man is the only being able to express an intelligible opinion, so we value our values over theirs. With regards to civilization, that’s just what humans do, so of course we think it’s a good idea.

Man is the measure of all things: of things which are, that they are, and of things which are not, that they are not.

So things are worth what we say they are. Insects, aliens, and omnipresent Gods are all welcome to prove me wrong. But they have to say it directly to me, as I won’t accept evidence from an intermediary.

“You ‘believe’, eh? Does the verb ‘believe’ mean you think that the statement ‘humans have worth is ‘true’? That it corresponds to reality? Based on what? Certainly not on “science” whatever that means.”

Divine authorship of our inalienable rights works within a framework of religious freedom and secular law. We just have to recognize that none of us is perfect enough to judge which faith is True or exactly what God calls us to be. Thus, rather than wage holy war, we work out a liveable framework of secular law, acknowledging certain inalienable rights.

“However, man is the only being able to express an intelligible opinion, so we value our values over theirs. With regards to civilization, that’s just what humans do, so of course we think it’s a good idea.”

If you look at history you will actually find out that some humans had very different values from yours.

Just to look at a recent example, Nazi ideology was an extreme form of naturalism, which highly esteemed end prized science and technology as an instrument of domination. While I disagree with it, I have to recognize that their worldview was actually intellectually pretty consistent. Yours, to be honest, sounds more like wishful thinking.

“Dakarian and Steph: I have a personal “theory” that religion comes in two broad categories. “Revealed” is based on holy text or strictly structured oral tradition (the Celts exemplified the latter). “Acquired” is based primarily on personal experience. They overlap in the sense that we are all learning creatures — an evolutionist would call that adaptation based on cognitive processes — and the category would be set by the order in which they take place.”

That’s more than a theory. The circles I wander around state that both really are needed for a close relationship with God (at least, if you define ‘Acquired’ as to include existential inspiration) with a focus on Acquired as the primary basis. The knowledge of the religion is Acquired via God using personal experience to ‘mold’ you to be ready for Him, then is enhanced through Revealed studies. Reveal style learning also helps set a foundation especially for younger generations (it can’t be used as a primary source since that just makes “luke warm Christians” that go to church, enjoy it, then live their lives as normal, but it makes the Acquired knowledge easier to swallow. I’ve met those who reach God 100% Acquired.. it’s a very painful process)

In the end, you need a mix of written/oral studies, personal experience, and existential inspiration to avoid the pitfalls: Revealed only religion results in the issues the Catholic faith suffers, which we have numerous articles on. Acquired (per your definition only) has the risk of moral relativism: warping the religion to suit your taste. Existential only, to be blunt, leads to madness (there’s truth to the idea that “seeing God leads to death.” If you’re picturing “God talks through my dog and tells me to KILL” sort of madness then you got the idea).

to put all that into secular terms, your worldview needs to be a mix of interpersonal discussion, personal observation, and some risky theories you’re willing to stand by.

The major problem here is that Christians (and other theists and believers in a fundamental metaphysical system) stand upon their hill, and explain how they have a grounding already. The problem is that they don’t. Saying you have a Ground of Being, and constructing complex narratives and philosophical systems around your assertion, does not a Ground of Being make. If you presuppose that God exists and define God as the Ground of Being, you have a word game. You may believe that this is a rock solid argument, but it is totally ridiculous to someone who rejects the premise of the word game.

This comes up in situations where Christians may object that atheists have no foundation for their morality, how can they justify their morality? But the question can be turned around, because atheists don’t believe Christians have a foundation for their morality either, and they are moral, and make justifications. Christians believe they have a foundation, but a belief in a fundamental fashion does not constitute reality. Concepts are not so concrete. This of course is a philosophical issue. If you are a Platonist of some sort you actually do believe that concepts are concrete! In sum, even the idea that you have a rational Ground of Being is a matter of faith.

The Nazis were just not very smart at covering their tracks. They were defeated militarily, not in principle, because their philosophy was quite consistent with a modern, advanced technological society. I think it will come back soon under a different guise, especially if there is a prolonged economic depression and a persistent process of secularization.

@Franklin I don’t understand your criticism in your first comment or “The challenge, as I see it, is to construct a natural law that is abstract, stated in general terms, and avoids self-referential fallacies. No appeals to deities accepted. Any takers?” in the context of this post.

My understanding is that Natural Law theory predates Christianity (it developed to provide a response to Euthyphro’s dilemma). While modern Thomists like Maritain are well known advocates of Natural Law theory, the claim is that Natural Law does not rest on religious claims – indeed a common Roman Catholic criticism of divine command moral theory common among protestants is that it is fideist. I appreciate the contribution of these philosophers, but I remain unconvinced.

The attempt to establish a foundation for morality in Natural Law fails for the same reason that all attempts at foundationalism fall (people start asking why this foundation and not that, why this criteria for deciding how to build on this or that foundation, etc…). Ideology and metaphysical speculation just isn’t very useful.

I’m not sure Christianity has much to offer by way of moral instruction. The New Testament takes morality as a given – Paul generally doesn’t try to convince his readers that action X is sinful. Rather the focus is on what to do when we realize we sin (“…That which I don’t want to do, I do and the things I want to do I don’t do. Who can save me from this body of death?”). In the NT, morality is seen as this innate (thought corrupted) guide we all have (where that innate guide comes from is a different issue). The question is how to be empowered to do those things (once you were…. now you are… here’s how to do that…) and what to do when we fail (“…I write this to you so that you will not sin. But if anybody does sin, we have an advocate with the Father—Jesus Christ, the Righteous One. He is the atoning sacrifice for our sins, and not only for ours but also for the sins of the whole world…”)

So I’m not sure divine command theory is necessary for establishing morality and foundationalist approaches are doomed to failure (including Natural Law theory). So where does that leave us? My answer is in large part why I am a conservative. I don’t trust ideology or rationalistic grounds for guiding right action. Rather, I lean on tradition (tradition of taboo, moral standards, etc…). We’ve probably evolved our traditional forms such that societies with traditional forms that work flourish and vice versa. This doesn’t make “natural” morality true or even the best it can be, but it does mean that we should be very, very careful about tinkering with it. It is not enough to say that you can’t prove we should have this or that taboo. Rather one should prove that removing that taboo won’t be harmful. This leads to much slower change, and I can understand why some would want to speed things up. I’m just not sure we can do better than evolution (its like beating the market – you might guess right once in awhile, but over the longterm you can’t beat it). It seems to me that reason should play a role in helping us learn from history and guiding our evolution.

So I may not be able to come up with a secular argument for why cock fighting should be illegal while it is OK to eat bacon, but I’m OK with that. We have a revulsion to seeing animals suffer and that is good enough for me. What I am very uncomfortable with is the attempt by elite opinion makers (from Hollywood to Madison Ave) to use heavy handed propaganda to drive moral evolution, and this is what I see in the sexual revolution – an attempt by the elites to throw off old taboos because there was no good reason for them. Unfortunately throwing aside these taboos have had a lot of unintended consequences that have made life worse for a broad swath of the population (though not necessarily for the elites). Our sexual mores didn’t evolve from the ground up in light of changing social developments. Rather it seems that relentless propaganda has convinced a lot of people that we shouldn’t be beholden to the old taboos. All the kids growing up without their dads didn’t get a say. The kids who saw their family ripped apart because dad needed to find himself or mom just didn’t feel the spark anymore didn’t get a say.

So when I look at the gay rights revolution, I worry. I don’t have any good philosophical arguments to offer, but things are changing very, very fast, and we don’t know what the consequences will be. Maybe the shift will be benign. But maybe not. I’m not convinced that attitudes are changing so much because we are more enlightened – indeed attitudes among generational cohorts aren’t changing all that much from what I gather. Rather, young people have been inundated with propaganda and had their moral outlook shifted. I hope the opinion shapers got this one right, because it appears there is no going back.

Carlo people didn’t care about the Nazi philosophy, they defeated them militarily because they were afraid of them. They were afraid of them because of their behavior. As Siarlys Jenkins says, people over thinking this.

1. I am allowed to marry who I love. Others should marry who they love.

2. I am allowed to marry the opposite gender. Others should marry their opposite gender.

Golden Rule tends to be a very useful rule. It alone isn’t enough.

Divine authorship of our inalienable rights works within a framework of religious freedom and secular law. We just have to recognize that none of us is perfect enough to judge which faith is True or exactly what God calls us to be. Thus, rather than wage holy war, we work out a liveable framework of secular law, acknowledging certain inalienable rights.”

Personally, I go one further than that (though what you say is true within a religious mindset. I know I am VERY glad that I can rely on God to decide what is right and inform myself and others of that right rather than figure it out on my own).

Myself, I state that religious law has no place within those that don’t follow the religion. To use the article’s example, my fork is clean to my God’s eyes no matter what material it is or what it has touched: I do not observe Kosher concepts. Not a single law I deem moral or important applies to those who don’t believe in Jesus. That Secular and religious law tend to agree is interesting and makes for fascinating study, but in practical terms it might as well be coincidence. The best we can and should ask for is for law that does not force me to betray my faith and works for the morals you stand by.

“Who can save me from this body of death?”). In the NT, morality is seen as this innate (thought corrupted) guide we all have (where that innate guide comes from is a different issue)”

Jeremiah 31:33 (“I will put my law in their minds and write it on their hearts. I will be their God, and they will be my people”)

Christianity would essentially be moral relativism without God. The only thing stopping the religious from saying “well, I’ll believe what’s in my heart and my heart says (whatever I wanted)” is that God then steps in and puts His morals in there that such that when the Christian actually looks at themselves, they cannot, in full honestly, declare their personal wants as moral law. In a sense, the entire faith is reliant on that little Angel On the Shoulder being an actual real thing.

As you can tell, it makes even attempting to evoke religious ideals on secular people impossible. How can you follow what God deems morally right if you do not even acknowledge God? At best you’ll follow what you ‘think’ is right. At worst you’ll be a blank slate for any person or entity to come and take control of for their purposes.

sdb, your 8:04pm post was very interesting. Much to ponder there. I do have an attempt to help you understand my challenge, contrary to your historical view: in the modern to us context, there is no Natural Law theory offered that is not also a deliberate construct of the religion of those offering it.

I can and do mean that as a complaint, but I also can and do limit it to an observation and find that it’s valid for many belief systems for which I have some affinity, affection or indirect connection.

I am enjoying the philosophical analyses in this thread, yours included.

from the article
“Secularism in the modern political meaning – the idea that religion and political authority, church and state are different, and can or should be separated – is, in a profound sense, Christian. “

honestly, I always thought ‘secular’ was the declaration of non religious/faith based ties. For example, if Christianity was Secular, it would not follow God. Under THAT meaning, Christianity isn’t secular.

The meaning you define, however is a different beast.

I don’t think Christianity demands that political authority be separate. I think there’s room for a Christian Country, for example. Christianity, however, does allow for a separate religious church and a secular state. It’s based on the idea that Christians are not a part of the World, just among it. The World hates God and hates our way, and that’s O. K.

Honestly, this is why I disliked the Religious Right, as it wasn’t an attempt so much to convert the US into a Christian state but, instead, to make a secular US it’s secular people follow religious rules. An Athiest that is forced to follow the 10 commandments is, to be blunt, an insult to God in ways that would leave me writing another 5000 word essay to describe. A Christian is free to vote according to their morals, but if the US wishes to work against it then best to shrug and move on.

Even rules that work against Christians isn’t rage worthy. the country allows us to fight against it,and we should. If we fail then so be it. If it doesn’t result in Sin then we were told to follow the Law of the Land. If it does then we simply ignore the law and continue to follow God ala Daniel.

If SSM was a matter between Christians and non-Christians, then it should’ve been decided long ago. However, I feel that the bulk of the SSM battle is between nonreligious who want it and nonreligious (or those who are attempting to battle non-religiously) that don’t.

you missed my point. You claimed that “things are worth what we say they are.” I said that historically people have given value to very different thing from those that you as an ex-Christian American value. The implication is that if all you have to justify your “belief” in human dignity is that you say so, you will not convince many other people.

Nazism was just a historical example of a very different approach that was defeated in an earlier incarnation but whose tenets (absolute naturalism) are in principle as valid as yours… because they say so! Whether and why it was defeated in the 1940’s is perfectly irrelevant.

@Dakarian “How can you follow what God deems morally right if you do not even acknowledge God?” I suppose it is because that we “know” what is right – the problem is that we don’t do it. As Jesus said, even unbelievers love their friends and family. People didn’t suddenly realize that murder was wrong when Moses came down the mountain.

“honestly, I always thought ‘secular’ was the declaration of non religious/faith based ties. For example, if Christianity was Secular, it would not follow God. Under THAT meaning, Christianity isn’t secular.” That is a very common misuse of the word secular. Your understanding of how church and state should relate are confused. I think you’ll find Hart’s analysis quite helpful even if you don’t ultimately agree.

@Franklin, you wrote,”…in the modern to us context, there is no Natural Law theory offered that is not also a deliberate construct of the religion of those offering it….”

Are you saying that there are no non-theistic advocates of Natural law? My understanding, limited as it is, is that Dworkin advocated for a form of natural law. It is also quite common among a number of Austrian school economists (not exactly a ringing endorsement for NLT, but they are generally a pretty secular bunch). But maybe I’m missing your point entirely.

From this atheist’s (in the not-believing-in-God sense, not the utterly-certain-God-does-not-exist sense) point of view, all of the criticisms of secular world views in fact apply to every world view. If my world view is “people should follow the Golden rule, because it is good to treat people well” then that requires some basic assumptions (like what is “good” and “well”). Some people may accept them, some may not. If my world view is “people should follow the Golden rule, because God says so and will punish you if you don’t” then that also requires some basic assumptions- and some people will accept them and some won’t. Just because one has a “top-end” of God and one doesn’t seem to have a “top-end” at all doesn’t seem to make a difference to me- all the questions about the lack of a top-end can apply to God.

They all come down to fundamental questions that can’t be answered with a purely logic-based exercise- they all require judgments and assumptions. For someone like me who doesn’t believe in God, the “God-based” world views offer me nothing- I’m literally forced to find a non-God-based world view.

sdb, you and I are at odds only over the scope of the argument. I am making rather sweeping statements that would better serve our thread if they were phrased better.

My primary concern on this topic is our society in the US. The voices getting the most prime time at the mic are the ones insisting on natural law from (in the US) the Christian position. Certainly there are other voices (some of which, including you, are right here on this thread), and I am grateful for them, but right now the debate is driven by a binary “for us or agin’ us” atmosphere.

The implication is that if all you have to justify your “belief” in human dignity is that you say so, you will not convince many other people.

Sure I can. Since humans are individually weak and collectively strong, it’s in our best interest to cooperate. We all have a stake in getting along. So my saying that they have worth and dignity will appeal to them on an emotional level, and they’re likely to agree and cooperate with me. If I tell other people they’re worthless they’ll likely hate me and not want to cooperate with me. If I act aggressively towards them they’re likely to cooperate with each other against me.

Whether and why it was defeated in the 1940′s is perfectly irrelevant.

Carlo, it’s actually relevant as it is a perfect demonstration of an aggressive actor getting people to cooperate and act collectively against them.

“Internally self-consistent maybe, just as many fantasy novels are. However Naziism, did not comport very well with reality.”

It certainly failed in terms of balance of power. But I was speaking philosophically. Assuming a strictly materialistic/naturalkistic view of reality, what is more intellectually consistent: Nazism or “belief in human dignity?”

I suppose it is because that we “know” what is right – the problem is that we don’t do it. As Jesus said, even unbelievers love their friends and family. People didn’t suddenly realize that murder was wrong when Moses came down the mountain.

I guess thinking more logically about my own statements what you say makes sense. I can’t just say “well there’s no God there so there’s no law” when one of the major aspects of the faith is that a person realizes that they are a sinner and that they need salvation to break away from that. How can someone end up in that place without the law already there.

Given that, the ““know” what is right” would be seeing that law already laid out.

(note that this is mostly arguing with myself here, showing that my own older theory fails under its own logic)

The flaw was that I was inadvertently picturing a God that gives morals to the believer but leaves the unbeliever alone which God specifically said He does not do.

Instead, it should be all-or-nothing. In my eyes, God gives everyone morality and it’s just a question of how to achieve it. Debating ‘morality without God’ is, honestly, similar to debating the merits of the Jewish viewpoint, or a Buddhist (“How can you follow the 8 fold path without Christ!?”). I’m not quite throwing the ‘Everyone has a religion’ card, but the practical application is the same.

It does help to emphasize why I take a “leave it to them” stance when it comes to non-Christian items, which gets to the next point.

That is a very common misuse of the word secular. Your understanding of how church and state should relate are confused. I think you’ll find Hart’s analysis quite helpful even if you don’t ultimately agree.

Actually, I found where the confusion lies. Wiki to the rescue:

“Secularity (adjective form secular,[1] from Latin saecularis meaning “worldly” or “temporal”) is the state of being separate from religion, or not being exclusively allied or against any particular religion.”

“Secularism is the principle of separation of government institutions, and the persons mandated to represent the State, from religious institutions and religious dignitaries”

My ‘Secular” definition is the first paragraph, your “Secularism” is the second. We’re both right in our own separate definitions, but wrong in correcting ourselves. Christianity isn’t Secular, but it follows Secularism. Pretty similar to the difference between being ‘social’ and believing in ‘socialism’.

Someday, we’ll put aside our differences in religion, race, gender, and politics and band together to wage war against the true Enemy of Humanity: the English Language!

Personally, even if I didn’t believe in God and Jesus, I would still try to do what the NT says as I believe it’s a good way to live even though I think it’s impossible to pull it off without Him. I haven’t found a better way of viewing and interacting with the world (though that’s not saying much given my limited experience).

Carlo, yes there can be groups that organize and pit their self interest against the interest of others. If they have better weapons or luck they can prevail for long periods of time. But I’m talking about long term outcomes. The SS no longer exists and the Sicilian mafia is a shadow of its former self (particularly in the US), so they’re examples of this trend.

Moreover how is religion a barrier to this sort of behavior? The Sicilian mafia came from a Catholic country, but clearly didn’t internalize any sort of teachings about the dignity and worth of the individual. They didn’t get struck down by lightning from on high either. It was humans who acted collectively against them via their government.

their millions of victims are no longer around either.
…
The point is whether goodness and justice are true in some deeper, metaphysical sense, or just a subjective whim.

Well that’s the problem of evil isn’t it. Does it really matter if goodness and justice are true in some deeper, metaphysical sense versus a subjective whim of mankind? God is silent and humans get stuck doing all the work of enforcing moral codes anyway. Sure there a promises that God will get around to it in the future when we’re all dead, but how will that help all those victims?

Frankly at least a whim of mankind at least has observable consequences and gets something done once in a while.

1. I am allowed to marry who I love. Others should marry who they love.

2. I am allowed to marry the opposite gender. Others should marry their opposite gender.

Certainly, for a parallelism, you want to phrase it like this:

1. I am allowed to marry who I love. Others should be allowed to marry who they love.

2. I am allowed to marry the opposite gender. Others should be allowed to marry their opposite gender.

Getting closer. Of course, for some people we have a conflict between 1 and 2. Also, no one is suggesting that opposite-sex marriages be banned. Everyone is allowed to marry an unmarried person of the opposite sex.

But what if the person you love is not of the opposite sex? You are essentially saying, “since chocolate is the only flavor of ice cream I like, everyone may like only chocolate.”

Shouldn’t the formulation be:

1. I am allowed to marry whom I love. Others should be allowed to marry whom they love.

2. I am allowed to marry someone of the sex I desire. Others should be allowed to marry someone of the sex they desire.

I thought my point about the Nazis was staringly obviously, but since I have to spell it out here it is:
Nazi ideology was based on a theory of racial distinctions and hierarchy for which the evidence is more void than the vacuum between galaxies, all wrapped up in a package of lurid, half-baked “Übermensch” mythology that bears not even a passing resemblance to the facts of biology and anthropology. Pointing to the Nazis as exemplars of rational materialism is about as lucid as pointing to a house cat and calling it an example of a herbivore. The Nazis were not children of your hated Enlightenment at all: they arose from a strain of German Romanticism (a movement that specifically rejected the Enlightenment) which had gone way off the deep end and turned nuttier than a gross of fruitcakes laced with crack.
We don’t need Aristotle’s metaphysics or Aquinas’ dancing-on-a-pinhead theology to save us from something like that. The facts alone suffice to condemn it.

JonF, I agree with you about the Nazis, but I let Carlo’s comparison slide because I didn’t want to get side tracked into what the Nazi’s beliefs.

Where Carlo and I differ is that he has stated that ideas are important and ultimately drive behavior. I tend to believe that humans desires control behavior, and we make up reasons to justify our desires. It seems self evident that some people have good desires, while others desire evil. The argument is ultimately about the ultimate source for our desires.